1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to material-handling systems, and more particularly to safety netting systems that protect workers and customers in the aisles below pallet shelves.
2. Description of Related Art
Shelves and racks are a convenient way to store items, and can maximize floor space when palleted material is stored many levels high. A typical warehouse retail store, e.g., The Home Depot, has material racks that are two, three, and four levels high. Heavy items, like backup store inventory on a pallet, are placed and fetched from high above by a forklift. These heavy items can weigh anywhere from ten to two hundred pounds.
Heavy items placed 10–20 feet high above aisles in material racks and on shelves can present a significant and not-so-rare personal injury risk. Shaking, bumping, and poorly stacked items can come tumbling down and hurt people below, or at a minimum damage the product.
Not surprisingly, a number of different devices and methods have evolved to address these problems. The law too has entered the picture with OSHA regulations, and personal injury lawsuits. New company procedures, union work rules, and plain common sense now dictate that an effective restraint, barrier, or guard system be installed on the higher shelves and rack to prevent falling debris.
As could be expected, some methods and devices are better than others. Conventional safety products can be expensive to buy, and difficult to work with or install. A simple netting secured all around the shelf opening can be effective if the netting is strong enough and secured well. But the way the netting is secured and constructed can mean opening the net to access the shelf is made very difficult, in some cases requiring a technician to climb high above and use hand tools to open and/or close the net.
A universal safety net system for pallet racks is described by Barry Cole in U.S. Pat. No. 4,981,225, issued Jan. 1, 1991 (Cole '225). A framework intended to support pallets of heavy material is faced with a heavy duty netting that prevents accidental falls to the floor of loose material. Such netting is tied at its edges to a perimeter of taut suspension cables. In FIG. 4 of Cole '225, an offset configuration is shown where the netting is stood out a few inches away from the front of the pallet shelving framework. Such offset is implemented by lower and upper universal offset members 60 and 70.
Such prior art offset brackets are not adjustable in how far they offset the netting from the face of the pallet rack because they U-bolt to the front faces of the framing. The way these are attached to the framing further does not provide maximum rigidity to keep the netting cables taut.